PT is soooooo hard...

Wait, is she...?

Yep, she is.

How is this little lady not crawling yet? Good question. She is, however, really good at push ups. :) Cracks me up! She wants to crawl sooooo badly, and she's pretty mobile by worming her way across the floor, wiggling and rocking back and forth. She has actually progressed to putting her knees down from this position, and she rocks back and forth on all fours, so I'll probably be saying she's crawling by my next post. Brent keeps laughing that she's better at PT (physical training) than he is. Maybe she can pass his physical test for him... 

RRaaaaaaarrrgggghhhh! I want to crawl!

It's so fun that these two can actually play together now. You should see our bathroom after bath time. Water everywhere...

For Drew's birthday, Keri gave him the best present -- his first Nerf dart gun, a six-shooter. And, of course, the boys had so much fun with it, that we had to buy daddy one, too. Then yesterday, we added a 36-pack of suction darts to our Nerf arsenal. Brent showed Drew how he could stick a dart to his head, becoming "Drewnicorn." However, Drew got it a little mixed up in his head -- he calls himself the "Drewbycorner." Now that we have a bazillion darts around, he became the "quadridrewbicorner." Say that five times fast...

Oh boy, this kids makes me laugh, every single day...

Soccer and motherhood...

Sorry, I'm not going to draw any profound conclusion about how soccer is like motherhood, except now that I think of it, motherhood can sometimes feel like someone kicked you in the shins, hard, but then it gets better and you feel the thrill of victory... Well, moving on. :)

About soccer, our season is drawing to a close. We only have one more practice and one more game with the Cool Cats, so I thought I'd share the team picture I took. All the kids are looking at the camera, so I consider it a success. Just like our little team here -- I think we only made one goal all season (all because Kenz got a throw-in goal -- woohoo!), but the kids all got a lot better! So, success.

Drew went from whining about not wanting to play to being sad when he had to sit out while it was someone else's turn. Still had some tears in the last couple of games when other kids stole the ball and he subsequently tripped, but he stopped crying and got back out there. That's what's important, just like in life when you sometimes fall down.... Hehe, just kidding. No more analogies. Really.

And, of course, thanks to our lovely and talented Coach Keri for crazily volunteering for this gig and making it so much fun for the kids. Thanks Keri!

My little soccer player -- he only looks like that when I'm taking his picture. He actually loves to play...

Go Cool Cats!

And now for the motherhood part you've been anxiously waiting for. Kindly waiting for me to get around to? Sure...

We had a little somethin' this weekend, a little day to appreciate the women in your life, you know... Yes, thank you, I had a nice Mother's Day. But I couldn't help this year thinking about how blessed I am to be a mom. I was feeling kinda bad -- no, not guilt like most women seem to feel, just unhappy about a few things -- and when Drew came and snuggled up in my arms, I realized that even if everything else in my life went wrong, everything would still be ok as long as I have Drew and Bryn (and the hubby too, of course).  And yes, living in tornado alley, I do think about what would happen if we got a big storm...

As long as I get to look into those blue eyes (yep, still blue and still crossing my fingers they stay that way), as long as she flashes that million-watt smile that makes strangers stop to say hello, as long as she makes happing baby noises when she wakes up in the morning..

...as long as I get to hug this little man every morning, and hear him tell me he loves me at night, as long as I get to enjoy as much of his craziness as possible during the day...

... I'll be ok, and I'll come out of things happy. Is it attitude? Because I'm trying to recognize the amazing blessings the Lord gave me? Partly. But also because I'm finally starting to see how important my mundane days are, how much I value getting to stay home with my munchkins, and because they really are the most amazing blessings.

Heavy, but hey, sometimes life is heavy, like an over-inflated soccer ball... ;) Had to throw one more in there, and I'm really just kidding with the analogies. Thought the title implied you'd get one, sorry they're super lame.

Happy Mother's Day!!

My big birthday boy -- AAAARRRGH!

Ahoy mateys! We're all about pirates around here lately, so for Drew's birthday, I decided to make him a pirate outfit (see my craft blog for more about that at nutmegboutique.blogspot.com) and sent him on a treasure hunt for his birthday. He first got this little get-up -- a white shirt, a pirate vest and a red bandana.

I think he really enjoyed it -- he ran from clue to clue, and yelled, "Another present!" when he found his next package. But the last one was my favorite -- we got him a treasure chest and filled it with gold d'bloons (not sure how to spell that), a sword, a spyglass and some more presents. Now he keeps all his birthday stuff in his treasure chest. I love that he likes make believe things now!

Earlier on his birthday, we took him to the amusement park with our friends. He took a bit to warm up, but then he really liked it. Then we did presents and whatnot, and then we went to Keri's for an Easter egg hunt (she has a much more fun backyard than we do).

Drew with all of his friends -- they all had so much fun! Thanks everyone for bringing eggs. The kids definitely weren't wanting, their baskets were all full! Plus, there's just something about keeping it small with your friends in the backyard. I loved it!

Top that off with some cupcakes that we let the kids put their own sprinkles on, and I think it was a success! Drew sure enjoyed his birthday cupcake...

And his second birthday cupcake...

Although, my favorite picture is of Brinks enjoying her third cupcake. I think she hit up different adults to get the paper off so she could keep digging in. Too clever...

Bryn couldn't really get in on the action, but she loved the swing. She was in it for like two hours! And if you look close, I got a good picture of those little toothies coming in on the bottom!

Drew is such a good big brother! Sometimes I'll ask him a question, and he'll say, "I'm a big brother." He's usually so good with her (although now that she's mobile, he's having a hard time sharing his toys with her).

We had a really good Easter, too! Although Drew kept asking where his next present was. Two days of books and movies and clothes and goodies was a lot of fun, he didn't want it to end! The kids got plenty of good stuff, and plenty of candy. Drew got into my stash of peeps, and left behind a bit of carnage -- he only bit off the heads!

Hope you all had a great Easter weekend!